Agroecology is a word with multiple definitions. Some define it as a narrow set of technologies to make farming more sustainable, while in a broader sense it is multifaceted and seen as: (a) critical thought —offering critical analysis of agrifood systems, both dominant and alternative—; (b) an inter- and trans-disciplinary science, both a ‘Western science’ and a ‘peasant science’, concerning how agoecosystems and food systems function, which provides the understanding needed to development transformative alternatives; (c) a variety of agricultural practices that allow sustainable farming without farm chemicals; and (d) a social movement that fights for social and environmental justice in the food system. Agroecology is currently being contested by different food system actors and is at risk of co-optation by various institutions and players, who attempt to redefine it within the confines of industrial food production, thereby diluting its transformative potential. Despite such attempts at appropriation, peasant agroecology, in particular, has a fundamental role as an alternative to the industrial food system, underlying the construction of local, sustainable food systems rooted in peasant agriculture and the principles of agroecology. In Africa and Latin America, for example, agroecology is an historical practice deeply embedded in indigenous and peasant knowledge systems, that today is critical to sustainable food production while offering challenges to dominant paradigms of agricultural development. There are intricate relationships among peasants, agroecology, and the broader struggle for food sovereignty, and social movements play a pivotal role of in advocating agroecological practices and resisting corporate control over food systems, agriculture, land, and territory.
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Peasant Agroecology in Africa and Latin America
Boaventura Monjane and Peter M. Rosset
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Worker-Driven Social Responsibility in the Food System
Teresa Mares and Laura-Anne Minkoff-Zern
The worker-driven social responsibility (WSR) model has emerged as an effective approach in centering the needs and priorities of food and farmworkers in creating transformational change. WSR has become a powerful force in addressing the injustices of the contemporary food system. This model directly challenges the power imbalance created by corporate concentration and complex supply chains, which concentrate wealth and power at the level of corporate executives and deprioritize rights and protections for workers. To best understand the potential of and need for WSR in the food system, one must consider the historical, legal, and economic contexts of labor in the food system, particularly the experiences of agricultural workers. As more worker organizations embrace the WSR approach, the WSR Network brings together workers across different supply chains and national contexts. Two important organizations in this network bring dignity and justice to food and farmworkers in the United States: the Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW) and Migrant Justice. The CIW’s Fair Food Program and Migrant Justice’s Milk with Dignity Program are exemplary WSR programs that have improved the lives of farmworkers and have garnered the support of thousands of allies. With the success of programs like the Fair Food Program and Milk with Dignity, the WSR approach is poised to extend even further across the food system, including sectors such as food processing.
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Food Politics and Policy
Marion Nestle
The food industry is a vast conglomeration of national and international companies that produce, process, manufacture, sell, and serve foods, beverages, and dietary supplements. Together, these companies generate close to $2 trillion in annual sales in the United States alone. To protect sales and profits, food companies use strategies that firmly link politics to food and food systems—everything that happens to a food from production to consumption and waste. Food politics refers to how governments of groups, cities, and countries make decisions affecting food systems and how they balance stakeholder pressures in making those decisions. Food policies are the means through which governments implement political decisions through food laws, regulations, administrative actions, and programs. Politics and policies are instruments of power over food production and consumption and over who profits or benefits from them. This power, however, is distributed unequally and inequitably, with large corporations—Big Food, Big Agriculture—holding far more power than individuals or groups acting in the public interest. Hence, politics.
